WP Theme Review: Ext JS WordPress Theme

The ExtJS WordPress theme was created by W.Regenczuk as an experiment or “proof of concept” to show the capabilities of the ExtJS library. With that said, this makes the ExtJS unique and the first of its kind.

I can imagine that people use the theme on their personal blogs, but to be honest the theme forces blog-viewers to concentrate on the content instead of personal expression, thus I recommend it for organizations that uses WordPress for exchanging knowledge.The Ext JS library gives web applications really good look&feel and – somehow – it “releases” people from thinking about the look&feel; allows people to read the content in peace. The phrase that describes Ext JS WordPress Theme the best is of course: “proof of concept”. WordPress, for sure, is not a good tool for making it “Ext JS-ified”. Anyway, it have been worth to try. There are two main goals which Ext JS WordPress Theme wants to achieve. First and foremost is to take advantage of all the stuff that gives us Ext JS library: layouts, menus, ajax, animations etc. The second goal is to look really good…

Screenshot:

Basic features:

Makes use of beautiful ExtJS styles

Makes use of real application ExtJS layout

Uses Ajax to load Entries

Sidebar uses famous Jozef Sakalos Accordion

Calendar Widget is ajaxified and ExtJS skinned

Quick Search displays search results during typing

Comments are posted via Ajax; without refreshing the content of the entry

One can open full page recent comments preview

Pages menu make use of ExtJS hierarchical menu

Theme is widgets and tags aware

My Take:
I agree with one of the visitors comments in ExtJS’s website about it looking like an email application rather than a blog theme. Btw, the ExtJS theme is released under the LGPL which means:

Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.

I’m not really sure about that, because one of the things that made WordPress popular and where it is now is the availability of free themes that can be modified and customized by the user. But again, this theme is not like other regular WordPress themes, this was not designed and created for personal use and heavy customization. As what the theme author mentioned, he recomments this theme for organizations that use WordPress for exchanging knowledge.

It’s cool that ExtJS is widget-ready and tag aware but some plugins and widgets may have issues and may not work with this theme. So make sure you test everything before you use this theme on your blog. The ExtJS theme still has several bugs and issues and that’s expected since it’s still in alpha.

Bloggers might be interested to know that this theme is not SEO or ad friendly. So if you’re a blogger who runs advertisements and do SEO on your blog, this theme is not for you but if you’re not into those stuff then you might to give this theme a try. Some of the things I like about this theme are: the option to change the look of the theme using ExtJS styles which work like skins; the layout can fit into almost any screen resolution and saves space because it uses the frame for the posts and the accordion style sidebar.

Great looking theme but not the type that most WordPress users are looking for. I give the ExtJS WordPress theme a 3.5 out of 5.

Owner and editor of JaypeeOnline. Self-proclaimed geek. New media writer and consultant. WordPress advocate. Loves blogging, gadgets, video games and sports. You can follow him on Google+, Facebook or Twitter.

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2 Comments

@wregen – Hello! I really like your “little” project and I’m looking forward to the beta and 1.0 version.

Btw, thanks for pointing out my mistake about the LGPL license. I didn’t know that it worked differently for text and software licenses. Also, thanks for providing the additional info on LGPL. You’re welcome and thanks for dropping by! :)

Hi there.
I really like your opinion about my little project. Just want to clarify one thing. The quote you have teken from LGPL refers to LGPL license text itself. But talking about the software means that LGPL allows you to do the following things with ExtJS WordPress Theme:

1. Use it as a component of your business applications in any way you wish.

2. Make unlimited copies without payment of royalties or license fees.

3. Make changes for use within your own company. The LGPL license does not require you to share those internal changes with the rest of the community.

4. Distribute changed versions of ExtJS Wordpres Theme to others, but if you distribute such changed versions you are required to share those changes with the rest of the community by publishing that changed source code under the LGPL.

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JaypeeOnline started out as a personal blog back in 2002 as a place for the author to share his experiences & rants. After a few years, the author learned more about blogging and saw its potential so he decided to become serious and focus on a specific niche. Since the author loved computers and gadgets, Technology was the obvious choice.

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